The first pantograph was constructed in 1603 by the German astronomer Christoph Scheinerand who used it to copy a figure on an enlarged or reduced scale. He wrote about his invention over 27 years later (1631), in “Pantographice“. The tool is still being used today by some artists and architects to Create an outline.

It’s based on parallelograms so that when moving one specified point, called the tracing stylus, along the outline of an image, an enlarged or reduced version of the image is created by the movement of another point, called the drawing stylus, which has a lead affixed to it.Make sense? Don’t worry if it doesn’t, all you have to know is what it does.

They come made out of a couple of materials. metal and wood.

1: Pantograph for drawing circles:

Pantograph for drawing circles

Blue, orange, green and yellow bars create a pantograph for drawing circle.
Two red pins and blue one are in line.
The blue pin traces a circle. Its center O lays on O1O2:
OO2 = O1O2(FE/AF)
Its radius R depends on angular position between pink and violet cranks and their radii.

2. Pantograph for drawing cycloid curves

Pantograph for drawing cycloid curves

Blue, orange, green and yellow bars create a pantograph.
Two red pins and blue one are in line.
The blue pin traces a curve of cycloid family (in green) subject to radii of pink and violet cranks, gear transmission ratio (2 for this video).